Denver Nuggets president Josh Kroenke says he’s rooting for Ty Lawson to get his career and life back on track. Lawson was recently traded to the Houston Rockets, this after getting busted with a DUI for the second time in a six-month period. Kroenke and the Nuggets did what they could to deal with Lawson’s […]

Kroenke and the Nuggets did what they could to deal with Lawson’s demons, but decided to cut the cord with the talented 27-year-old point guard once he veered down a “dark path.”

Per Yahoo! Sports:

Kroenke said on Tuesday in a phone interview that the Nuggets had been privately trying to help Lawson with his issues for “the past couple of years” and that there had been problems for a long time. […] Kroenke said he had repeated conversations with Lawson about his “life struggles,” adding that Lawson often said he would attempt to fix his issues but he could “never fully shake them.”

“He always had an affinity for burning the candle at both ends,” Kroenke said. “We want to give our players freedom to be young guys as well. We’re not going to be drill sergeants. But we want our guys to be able to handle their personal lives on their own. […] Ty … there were times when he was better than others. But the problems have been there for several years, going back to when we were having a lot of on-court success. I don’t want to go back too far. There were just a lot of times where you were at practice and you just know. You could smell it. You know there is probably deeper issues than he would probably let on.”

“There weren’t a lot of teams [interested in Lawson],” Kroenke said. “Houston was in a position where this could put them over the top. We’re fully aware of that. We couldn’t look at this deal from any perspective but our own. […] In the long run, I hope [the trade] is a good thing for Ty Lawson, the person. There are no guarantees. Sometimes you just need to hear the message from a different person. Sometimes a change of scenery is the best thing for all parties. That’s the way we looked at this. … I think Ty Lawson, the person, is starting to understand more so than he ever has the things he needs to do in order to keep his career on track and more importantly get his life on track.”

The Denver Nuggets are a 3-7 trainwreck, and their issues extend well beyond the court. Head coach Brian Shaw has voluntarily placed himself on the hot seat, the front-office doesn’t seem to know what it’s doing, and there’s now chatter that star forward Kenneth Faried is an unpopular figure within the organization. GM Tim Connelly, […]

GM Tim Connelly, who’s come under heavy criticism from other execs around the L, says that every Nuggets player is considered a “movable asset”.

Per ESPN:

Several sources around the league, a few close to the Nuggets, say the organization is “rudderless” under the controls of a young front office, led by general manager Tim Connelly, that has neither the experience nor the savvy to survive in a league whose executive ranks are teeming with predators. […] “I’m not sure Tim can do the job,” a league power broker, who has known Connelly for years, said. “He’s the nicest guy you’ll meet, but he’s out of his depths, and you saw it with the [Kenneth] Faried mess.”

Several sources around the league insist the Nuggets’ hand was forced with regard to Faried. After the signing of [JJ] Hickson to a three-year, approximately $16 million contract soon after Connelly’s arrival, the sense was the bouncy big man was insurance against Faried’s departure in free agency in 2014. Faried was a fan favorite in Denver, but multiple sources with knowledge of the Nuggets’ thinking maintain the team “isn’t crazy about him,” particularly Shaw. But with Faried’s boffo showing last summer with Team USA and a loyal following in Denver, the media-conscious Nuggets caved, adding yet another imperfect 4-man to their lot.

“[Faried] is a helluva player and plays hard, but he isn’t well liked [in the organization],” a league source said. “That gets glossed over. He says crazy s—. He thinks he’s the guy, and other guys take exception to his contract.”

]]>http://www.slamonline.com/nba/report-kenneth-faried-well-liked-denver/feed/0SLAMonlineNuggets President Adamant Brian Shaw Will Not Leave for the Knickshttp://www.slamonline.com/nba/nuggets-president-adamant-brian-shaw-will-not-leave-for-knicks/
http://www.slamonline.com/nba/nuggets-president-adamant-brian-shaw-will-not-leave-for-knicks/#commentsFri, 23 May 2014 16:28:48 +0000http://www.slamonline.com/?p=323893

Phil Jackson may need to adjust his wish list for the next Knicks coach again. Denver Nuggets president Josh Kroenke told Yahoo that he fully expects head coach Brian Shaw—who has been linked to the Knicks’ vacancy due to his ties to Jackson—to return to the team next season: After weeks of speculation over New York […]

Phil Jackson may need to adjust his wish list for the next Knicks coach again. Denver Nuggets president Josh Kroenke told Yahoo that he fully expects head coach Brian Shaw—who has been linked to the Knicks’ vacancy due to his ties to Jackson—to return to the team next season:

After weeks of speculation over New York Knicks president Phil Jackson’s intrigue with luring Denver Nuggets coach Brian Shaw to Madison Square Garden, Denver president Josh Kroenke made it clear to Yahoo Sports on Thursday night: It isn’t happening.

“Brian has said publicly – and privately to us – that his desire is to be here, and we feel strongly about him as our coach,” Kroenke told Yahoo Sports. “I don’t foresee a scenario or circumstance where he’s going to be anywhere but with the Nuggets next season.”

The Knicks haven’t reached out for permission to speak with Shaw, who went 36-46 in an injury-plagued first season as coach of the Nuggets. Denver is expected to return several key players from serious injuries next year, including Danilo Gallinari, JaVale McGee and Nate Robinson.

The elimination of Shaw, a long-time Jackson assistant and player with the Los Angeles Lakers, keeps Oklahoma City guard Derek Fisher as the frontrunner for the Knicks job, league sources said. Jackson is waiting for the Thunder’s season to end to discuss the opening with Fisher, who has a strong interest in becoming a head coach next season, sources tell Yahoo Sports. Jackson wants a coach whom he can mold and who will run his famed triangle offense.

After the Denver Nuggets surprised everyone by firing head coach George Karl, we had reports claiming that Karl and the front-office weren’t on the same page during the season. Karl — who’s looking for another job — spoke to the Denver Post about his firing, and he did not hold back in his assessment of the controversial decision: “On his conversation with team president Josh Kroenke upon being fired: ‘Josh was nice and complimentary, said he’d honor my contract and the coaches. The conversation was on the decision, and I said, ‘I think I should tell you, I think it’s very stupid.’ And since then, I don’t understand it.’ On this past season, winning 57 games, and criticism that he didn’t develop the team’s young players well enough. ‘We won 57 wins and are in a great place. Continuity, consistency, togetherness all are so much more valuable than they have on their priority list than playing JaVale McGee or the young players. And first of all, it shouldn’t be that I didn’t play young players, it’s I didn’t play young players enough, because we played a lot of young players — Kenneth Faried, Kosta Koufos, Evan Fournier at the end of the year, Ty Lawson. And I never had a meeting where that disappointment, in that part of it, was voiced to me. I never had that meeting. I heard through whispers. I’m sorry that 57 wins doesn’t make you happy.’ […] On his relationship with the city and fans: ‘I think the most important thing, whenever it all settles, is many fun chapters of coaching, and the most fun was the last 15-20 months with a team that is very young but also capable of being very good. Ten days ago, we were fired up, excited about the summer. My 8 ½ years, by far this is the most soulful connection I’ve had to the game of basketball, the city and the excitement of the city. A lot of it has to do what we’ve gone through. Initially you get Allen Iverson and that doesn’t work out, then you get Chauncey Billups and we’re near the top of the mountain. Then I get cancer. Then we come back. And so much of this stuff is all good – except we don’t win in the playoffs. I’m not going to stand here and justify my (playoff) record, I’m disappointed in my record.'”

According to multiple published reports, George Karl’s surprising firing today wasn’t just caused by the team’s refusal to give the reigning NBA Coach of the Year a contract extension as he entered the final year of his deal. Denver Nuggets management had problems with Karl’s philosophy and approach, which didn’t align with the front-office’s wishes. Per the Denver Post and Fox Sports: “As one NBA executive told me: The Kroenkes don’t do leverage. They blow up the bridge of negotiations. ‘Then,’ the NBA exec added, ‘Stan Kroenke comes and blows up your house.’ Boom. Karl is gone. After a 57-win regular season, the opening-round playoff loss to Golden State was devastating. But getting beat by the Warriors wasn’t as upsetting as how Denver lost. During the playoff series, center JaVale McGee averaged 18.5 minutes per game, mirroring his meager playing time of the regular season. His first starting assignment of the season did not arrive until the Nuggets trailed 3-1 in the best-of-seven series. Denver’s front office did not pay McGee $10 million per season to eat popcorn on the bench. Karl stubbornly refused to develop McGee, insisting to me that a coach’s focus is winning the next game on the schedule. That’s not only ego-driven and short-sighted, it was a source of friction between Karl and his superiors long before trouble arrived against the (Golden State) Warriors, when McGee forlornly told me after a practice in San Francisco the playoff series didn’t work for him, offensively or defensively. […] Even though the Nuggets were coming off a season in which they set a team record for wins by going 57-25, Karl was falling out of favor after nine seasons in Denver. Sources Thursday offered some of the reasons for that. The Nuggets, seeded third in the West, flamed out in the first round of the playoffs, losing 4-2 to No. 6 Golden State. Management blamed Karl for the loss, believing he panicked by trying to match up with the Warriors’ small-ball approach after they had lost David Lee due to injury in Game 1. The Nuggets all season had been able to beat up teams in the paint, and they moved away from that style. […] Even before the Golden State series, management had some friction with Karl. The Nuggets had signed center JaVale McGee to a four-year, $44 million contract last summer. Team brass wanted Karl to use McGee, 25, more so he would develop. However, Karl insisted on starting center Kosta Koufos, whom management regarded as a backup. McGee got only an average of 18.1 minutes per game to 22.4 for Koufos. Management wanted Karl to develop players more for the future than Karl wanted to do. Team brass would have been willing for the Nuggets to sacrifice some regular-season games for development. Along those lines, management also believed Karl used Andre Miller, 37, at point guard more than it was believed he should. Miller averaged 26.2 minutes, taking time away from promising rookie Evan Fournier, who averaged 11.3. Then Fournier surprisingly started four games in the playoffs when he wasn’t ready.”

Well, you certainly don’t see this type of thing every day. The Nuggets had to include Chauncey Billups in the ‘Melo trade, and because he’s such a beloved member of the Denver community, the team felt an obligation to apologize to him and his family. From the Post: “His inclusion in the trade to the New York Knicks was the name that really stung for Nuggets fans. Billups grew up here, played basketball at George Washington High School and the University of Colorado and never wastes an opportunity to show his love for the city. That’s why, said Nuggets executives Josh Kroenke and Masai Ujiri, it was painful to let him go. And that’s why the duo opened their Tuesday evening news conference in an unusual manner. ‘I want to offer a personal apology to the Billups family,’ Kroenke said. ‘They mean the world to me personally, and I know that Chauncey means everything to Denver. And when I say Denver, I mean just Denver basketball on every level. He is Denver basketball. He was a high school star here, he was a college star here, he was a professional star here. It was an incredibly tough decision to include him in this trade.’ Added Ujiri: ‘It was hard. This trade took this long because of Chauncey. We tried every way not to include him in this trade. It’s one of the most difficult things. What a great professional, what a great person, what a great family. He will always be welcome in Denver, and he knows that.’ Throughout the trade saga, Billups maintained the stance he never wanted to leave the Nuggets. His preference would have been to retire a Nugget.”

“We feel we got killed in the trade because we lost a couple of pretty good players,” Ujiri said. “Obviously, Carmelo Anthony. I feel sad for the city of Denver. I feel bad that this was done on my watch. To lose a guy like that. And also Chauncey (Billups). But I think we had to do it.”

“This was a process that was started by Carmelo; everything that we did just now was at his request,” said Kroenke, who hadn’t spoken on the record during the drawn-out trade process. “Our perceived desire to go young or cut salary (is unfair). The salary thing really hits hard with me because we’ve been in the luxury tax four of the last five seasons. We have a top-five payroll in the league this season. Our market doesn’t even come close to supporting that. The notion that this organization somehow is only concerned with cutting costs is absurd. We’ve explained that to Carmelo. This is all a result of his request to play in a different market.”

Denver is right, of course. Losing a superstar in the NBA, no matter what pieces you get in return, is a devastating blow to a franchise.

The Nuggets will remain competitive this season, and may even hang on and squeeze into the Playoffs. But they and everyone else knows there’s no replacing what ‘Melo represented.

The soap opera playing out in Denver is a lot like watching a bad marriage slowly crumble. One side (seemingly) wants out, while the other, knowing full well that everything would be ruined should a split happen, desperately tries to hang on.

The Nuggets introduced their new VP of basketball operations to the world yesterday, and his first task is the most important job in the entire organization: convince Carmelo Anthony to stay.

The team attempted to paint a rosy picture between Anthony’s representatives and front-office execs in Denver, and as the Denver Post reports, the Nuggets are ready to listen to ‘Melo, assuming he wants to talk:

The Nuggets’ new executive vice president of basketball operations, Masai Ujiri, reiterated Tuesday he intends to meet with Anthony soon to get a clearer picture of what the star forward wants to see in order to convince him Denver is the place to stay for at least three more seasons.

“I think that all the speculation is about the team,” Ujiri said. “I think the team is a good team. I don’t know if he has anything that he wants us to do. I think he’s been treated very well by this organization, and he’ll continue to be treated well by this organization. I’ll wait and talk to Melo and see what he has to say. I think so far things have been positive. There’s been a lot of speculation, but hey, that’s how it works in our business.”

“Anything that has been said is either someone trying to manipulate the situation behind the scenes or other motives that are unknown at this point,” [Josh] Kroenke said. “But Melo and his representation have been great to us. I think he knows he can come to me as an individual. We have that amount of respect that we can talk about things openly in a noncombative way. So anything that has been stated from sources behind sources . . . All of our talks have been extremely cordial. I haven’t had a negative conversation with Carmelo Anthony since I’ve known him, and that goes back to my time as a college basketball player. I don’t have a bad word to say about Melo as a person.”

The battle to win back Carmelo Anthony’s heart and mind in Denver has officially begun.

Stan Kroenke is taking his talents to the land of the NFL, leaving his son to handle Denver’s hoops team. From the Denver Post: “As followers of the NFL, particularly those emotionally attached to the St. Louis Rams, were introduced to Stan Kroenke on Wednesday, many Denver-area sports fans were technically waving goodbye. By unanimous approval, NFL owners voted to approve Kroenke’s full purchase of the Rams. To comply with the NFL’s cross-ownership policy, Kroenke will transfer by year’s end the financial interest of the NHL’s Avalanche and the NBA’s Nuggets to his son, Josh. Denver, it seems, will soon become well acquainted with the work of Josh Walton Kroenke. ‘Josh Kroenke, in my view, has been ready to take over the Nuggets for a couple of years,’ Stan Kroenke said. ‘I just haven’t put him in that position. He was — and still is — very young, but he’s had his 10,000 hours, if you read Malcolm Gladwell. Josh is ready to do that.’ Josh Kroenke is 30 years old and stands a shooting guard-sized 6-feet-4 which he was at the University of Missouri for coach Quin Snyder. Josh was born, raised and educated in Columbia, Mo. Besides holding the controlling interests of the Avalanche and the Nuggets, he will have executive decision-making powers with the Nuggets. And he will be baptized with an emotionally charged issue: keeping high-scoring superstar Carmelo Anthony in Denver.”

The team reportedly met with Melo over the weekend, but the owner’s son could not break the stalemate with the star forward: “Denver Nuggets executive Josh Kroenke met with Carmelo Anthony in Baltimore over the weekend and restarted the process of selling the disgruntled star on signing a contract extension, league sources told Yahoo! Sports. No resolutions were reached, sources said, but Kroenke, the owner’s son, has undoubtedly emerged as a far more powerful voice in the franchise. His burden is unmistakable now: As a 30-year-old on the cusp of taking over majority ownership of the Nuggets, he must sell the All-Star forward on staying the course with the Nuggets. The Nuggets are close to hiring a new general manager – with former Phoenix Suns executive David Griffin the frontrunner – but Kroenke and adviser Bret Bearup will have the most significant say in basketball matters.”